The answer is yes, for now, and maybe no later, once all the data is in.

For now, yes, health care spending is projected to rise under health care reform, according to a report earlier this year from the Office of the Actuary with the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

But that could change rather quickly as new data from pilot programs contained in the Affordable Care Act of 2010 are calculated as savings, said Chief Actuary Richard Foster in a Congressional hearing earlier this month.

I actually watched this hearing on C-SPAN. I wouldn't advise this under most circumstances. But I really wanted to hear this well-respected actuary talk about health care reform.

In testimony before Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., chair of the House Budget Committee, Foster said there are two main reasons for the 0.2 percent relative increase in national health care spending through 2019.

One, more than 32 million additional people will be covered by insurance over the next decade, reducing the projected number of uninsured from 50 million to 18 million, or a 15 percent uninsured rate to 8 percent.

Two, insurers will be mandated to fix several problems that have led to thousands of personal bankruptcies and even hundreds of premature deaths.

Under health reform, insurers must eliminate lifetime caps on coverage, allow children up to age 26 to be on family policies and eliminate bans on preexisting conditions.

Both these factors will cost billions of extra dollars.

Foster said that average annual growth in national health care spending will be 6.3 percent from 2009 to 2019, 0.2 percent higher than without reform. As a percent of the gross domestic product, health care stands to be 19.6 percent, or 0.3 percentage points higher than before reform.

Some say a 0.2 percent increase, even if that stands, is still a good deal for America as a society.

Others, the naysayers about health care reform, say this proves that ObamaCare is a bad deal and will lead to all sorts of unforeseen problems.

But even if it is a bad deal, and even if the unaccounted-for savings never materialize, it is hard to imagine that the naysayers are right that a 0.2 percent increase in health care costs through 2019 will ruin the U.S.

Under questioning from two Democratic congressmen, Reps. Karen Bass, D-Calif., and Bill Pascrell, D-N.J., Foster acknowledged that he did not count the more than dozen cost saving pilot projects embedded in the Affordable Care Act.

For example, Foster said there was not enough data to project savings from several pilot projects to create Accountable Care Organizations, which are groups of providers that agree to coordinate care for Medicare patients, and share savings with Medicare.

"There's a lot of potential good things to come out of innovation, higher quality and lower cost," Foster said. "But for us to estimate a specific result we have to know something specific that is going to be considered. And because there was not sufficient specifications or provisions underlying most of these, we were not able to."

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that by 2019 ACOs will save Medicare $1.2 billion a year, a figure that is 1 percent of the $895 billion that Medicare is projected to spend in 2019.

Foster said he expects to have enough data in March or April to add those ACO savings into the mix.

CBO also estimates some reduction in premiums from the health insurance exchanges that go into play in 2014. CBO says savings from the exchanges from 2015 to 2025 could total as much as $34 billion.

The physician and hospital community also believe that developing patient-centered medical homes, which already are exploding in Southeast Michigan, can reduce health care costs by improving quality and eliminating duplicative services.

Health insurance exchanges and medical homes are not yet counted as savings.

Foster also did not count savings that will come from research on comparative effectiveness. The health reform bill has $1 billion available, most of it already granted to organizations like the University of Michigan and other research-oriented health care organizations.

Comparative effectiveness, most experts believe, will result in higher quality care and lower costs.

Researchers are studying hundreds of medical procedures, technology, medications and other generally accepted best medical practices, and will recommend better, less costly and higher quality ways to treat people.

One group at Dartmouth College, which produces the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care, has already given a glimpse of potential savings using this approach.

The Dartmouth study says that if best practices were used nationwide, instead of just in certain areas, the nation could save 20 percent to 30 percent off our total $2.5 trillion health care tab.

Critics say those savings may be inflated. But they do not dispute Dartmouth's findings that there are wide geographic variations in health care prices, quality and outcomes that should be further studied.

Foster said this: "I think of the creation of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation within CMS, some of the other programs, the shared savings program for accountable care organizations, the bundle payment demonstration … Many of these do, in fact, have potential and some of the things we don't even know about yet, some of the things that have yet to be designed or specified or tested or evaluated. I'm a big believer in research."

Once those savings are calculated by Foster and his actuaries, many experts believe the 0.2 percent increase in national health spending will vanish.

A recent Commonwealth Fund report that concludes a variety of cost containment provisions in the health reform bill could slow the annual growth in national health expenditures from 6.5 percent to 5.6 percent over the period 2010 to 2020.

Now, whether that will actually play out over the next 10 years, who knows? This early in the game, I am not willing to toss in the towel and say it won't happen.

But in the survey by Livonia-based Market Research Strategies, only 28 percent of those surveyed said provisions in the bill will reduce health care costs.

I believe most people said that based on Foster's report and over-listening to the naysayers who just do not like any government intervention in private industry. Of course believing that government plays no role in industry is a fantasy in and of itself.

Just look at oil company and farm subsidies, not to mention the income tax system that rewards companies who transfer jobs overseas or wind up paying zero income tax because of various loopholes.

Most companies have seen their health care costs rise 8 percent to 12 percent annually the past decade. Not too good. This is why companies have been shifting more and more costs to employees. For example, many people paid 43 percent of their health care costs in 2010, up from 33 percent in 2004.

According to Foster, the health reform bill helps people with out-of-pocket costs, which is called OOP. I am not kidding that is what Foster and his merry band of actuaries call it.

In 2014, OOP spending is projected to decline by 1.1 percent as the major provisions of the Affordable Care Act are implemented and millions of people, many of whom were previously uninsured, attain health coverage through Medicaid or the exchanges.

Without reform, OOP spending growth was expected to be 6.4 percent.

So now what do you think? Still want to repeal the health care reform bill?

I, for one, am waiting on further research from Foster and will be listening very carefully to hospital and physician experts on the many pilot programs funded by the health care reform act that are designed to lower costs and improve quality.